As a season closer, the 59th In-N-Out Burger NHRA Finals at In-N-Out Burger Pomona (Calif) Dragstrip had more twists and turns than any drag racer wants to experience. There was good (actually great), bad and ugly during this three-day Mission Foods Drag Racing Series race meeting for Top Fuel, Funny Car, Pro Stock and Pro Stock Motorcycle. Dreams were fulfilled, others dashed, records set and, perhaps a new dynasty unveiled?
Weather ruled Friday’s proceedings, with only a full session of Funny Car and partial grouping of Top Fuel nitro-powered cars qualified, before rain, that traditionally backs against the Pomona area mountains won the afternoon. Jack Beckman, subbing for the recovering John Force in the John Force Racing Chevrolet Camaro SS led the Funny Car contingent, beating his squad-mate Austin Prock and Jim Head’s Ford Mustang for Blake Alexander. Shawn Reed led the nine Top Fuel cars that were able to get down the track before the rain stopped the balance of Top Fuel, Pro Stock and Pro Stock Motorcycle, followed by Billy Torrence and Ida Zetterstrom.
Everything changed on Saturday. The skies were clear and cool, just right for quick and fast racing. That sort of weather perfection garners quick laps and that’s what NHRA got, as third-generation racer Austin Prock, filling in for medically excused Robert Hight, a three-time Funny Car titleholder with John Force Racing (JFR) earned his 15th No. 1 qualifier of the 2024 season and simultaneously his first NHRA Funny Car championship.
The 29-year-old, who has been racing since the age of 10 and was the USAC National Midget champion just a decade ago, started his drag racing career in 2019 with JFR in a Top Fuel dragster. When sponsorship evaporated for this season and Hight’s services weren’t available, he began his Funny Car career at the non-points-paying PRO Superstar Shootout at Bradenton dragstrip by winning that race, then began the 20-contest NHRA sprint earning a runner-up slot to Kalitta Motorsports’ J.R. Todd’s Toyota GR Supra at the first race of the year, the Amalie Motor Oil Gatornationals in Gainesville, Fla.
All told Prock enjoyed eight race victories – starting at Phoenix, the second race of the year – and, along the way made 14 consecutive winning round wins, three Countdown to the Championship victories and wrapped up the title when Beckman was unable to hold the No. 1 position. At the end of the weekend, John Force Racing’s Flopper duo ran one-two for the season, as Prock earned the team’s 21st Funny Car title and 23rd championship overall, joining Brittany Force’s pair of dragster titles.
While Prock blazed to his title on Saturday, Sunday was the day he performed a feat no other drag racer has done in 1,000 feet: he ran his first lap, against Jason Rupert, at 3.828 seconds against the nostalgia Funny Car veteran, but it was the speed coaxed by co-crew chiefs Jimmy and Thomas Prock, Austin’s father and brother, that broke the bank. Prock became the first driver to officially eclipse 340mph with his lap of 341.68 mph. “I’m comfortable in this thing,” Prock told the world. “I’ve been able to catch the scoreboard the last two runs. When we ran .80, I saw it and right there I caught it. I just love Pomona,” he verified. “This is unreal to run 3.80 last night and go 341.68 today. This is one fast Chevrolet and we’re the first NHRA team to do it!”
It was Beckman, though, who won the battle for a race win late Sunday evening, well after sunset, the sole driver to win from the right lane in the dark of night. It was Beckman’s second victory in his eight-race sprint as the replacement racer for John Force, who was on-site this weekend to watch his three-car team perform for the final time this year. Beckman, who hasn’t raced professionally since the protracted 2020 season where he won the season finale on The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, hasn’t competed at Pomona since the 2020 Winternationals, held before COVID-19 shut down the country and racing in general.
“It doesn’t get any higher than this,” Beckman said. “I won here at the 2019 Finals, at the 2020 Winternationals and I hadn’t raced at Pomona since then.” While the Winternationals victories were great, “The Finals is the Finals, right? Whoever wins here gets a couple months to say, we were the baddest on race day.” Finishing second in the standings for Force after eight races back in the driver’s seat might seem okay to some, but being out of the game since 2020 and coming back, winning two races and helping to place the legendary John Force’s Camaro in second for the final standings was a great feat for someone who had little time in a race cockpit the past four seasons.
Brittany Force joined Prock as No. 1 in Top Fuel after three qualifying sessions had been completed, continuing her strong end-of-season rebound, while Greg Anderson and Matt Smith took top qualifying honors in Pro Stock and Pro Stock Motorcycle, respectively. Would the quartet’s supremacy reign on race day? In the dragster class, the top two racers qualified at 3.64-second laps, while in Funny Car, Jim Dunn Racing’s Dodge Charger was DQ’d for a header issue.
Again, Sunday skies were clear and cool, as everyone prepped for four rounds of eliminations, starting at 11AM PT. Two rounds of eliminations were run in Top Fuel, which always starts competition for the day, before the absurd took over. A light plane crashed at top end in the motor home area next to the track’s left lane, unable to continue across the street to the general aviation airport’s landing strip next door to Pomona’s Fairplex. That absurdity took two hours to clear up before racing resumed at 1PM for the balance of the dragster field and all other categories. There was damage to property and some injuries, but none were life-threatening.
When it was time to race once more, the first pair were a marquee matchup: points leader Justin Ashley versus three-time champ Antron Brown. Smart money would be on Ashley, with the No. 5 qualifying slot to Brown’s 12th place result after Saturday’s two sessions. But smart money isn’t always what gets to the finish line first and it was Brown who took the win by a scant .0102-second gap. In all, six of the eight winning first-round Top Fuel racers lapped the 1,000-foot dragstrip in less than 3.7-seconds. It would be a quick and fast day for many, but none more than Brown who, by winning a pedalfest against fellow challenger Shawn Langdon in the second round, then by halting a JFR double-up by beating Brittany Force in the semifinals, locked up championship No. 4, his first as a team owner.
In the final round, it was new champ Brown against Kalitta Motorsports’ exiting champ Doug Kalitta, and again Brown would show the racing world his championship chops by mounting a very strong attack, running 3.681/330.55 to Kalitta’s 3.710/331.94 lap. It’s been eight years since Brown notched his third title and he performed his feast by eliminating two of the other four drivers in contention before his semifinal victory. When Brown won the race late Sunday night, he earned his 80th career winner’s trophy in both Top Fuel and Pro Stock Motorcycle.
Coming into this event lagging by 44 points with round wins counting for 30, rather than the customary 20 points, “This team has been resilient,” Brown stated. “We never quit; we never stop. We didn’t qualify where we wanted to, and when we saw our matchups, it was like doomsday. We had Justin Ashley in the first round and we knew that was a monumental matchup. Then you go to Shawn Langdon and we both were trying to throw at it and it didn’t go down. That last round against Brittany, we gotta hit the tree, go down the track. That 3.69 [in the semifinal round] came right on time.”
Going into the finals against Kalitta, co-crew chief Brian Corradi said to Brown, “let’s throw some more at it.” With an exceptional track at his disposal, “We left it all out on the racetrack,” Brown said. “Had a good light, went down there, got the win, pulled it off. To win the race and win the championship is unreal. It was a heck of a race day and a heck of a show.” This race marked the final race for Mark Oswald, Brown’s co-crew chief who announced his retirement before Sunday racing began. Oswald has worked with Corradi and car chief Brad Mason, who’ll be moving up the chain at AB Motorsports, for all four titles. As a driver, Mark Oswald has a single NHRA Funny Car title together with four IHRA season titles.
NHRA did something unusual in this 20th and final race of the season. For the World Finals last round, they ran Funny Car first, then Top Fuel, Pro Stock Motorcycle and Pro Stock last. The reason for this change-up? Pro Stock was the sole class in which a champion had not yet been crowned…
Pro Stock Motorcycle’s championship decider came to the first round win by Vance & Hines Motorsports’ lead rider Gaige Herrera, who earned his second straight title when he defeated Clayton Howey on a Suzuki. While Herrera wouldn’t win the race this time around – No. 1 qualifier Matt Smith and his Buell earned that honor and will return next year after threatening retirement – the second year champ came in with a 119-point lead after three consecutive Countdown victories, giving him 10 for the season. He’s won 21 of 29 events contested since he started racing, and no professional NHRA racer has ever produced as many wins in such a short time frame.
In winning the first six races of a 15-race calendar this year, Herrera set the all-time NHRA record with 11 straight victories and 46 consecutive round wins, but defeats at the Western Swing of Seattle (Chase Van Sant won on WAR Racing’s Suzuki) and Sonoma, where Smith showed he wasn’t ready to lie down and give up, surging to runner-up status as he challenged his much younger competitor. The duo were matched in the final round at Pomona and Smith was the victor with his 6.705/202.12 beating Herrera’s 6.722/201.91. Close races are what fans love about NHRA racing; they sure got their wishes granted this weekend.
“I think the first round for the championship was the most nervous I’ve ever been,” Herrera admitted. “It’s what you dream about as a little kid but, win or lose, I still love this sport. At Indy two years ago I made my [NHRA] debut and, at the time I thought it was a one-race deal. Now here we are, two years and two championships later. I still can’t believe it!”
The Sunday racing came down to Pro Stock, a winner-take-all battle between points leader Dallas Glenn and his teammate, five-time champion Greg Anderson, both racing Chevrolet Camaro cars for KB Titan Racing. While Elite Motorsport’s Aaron Stanfield led the points chase coming into this final race of the season, he lost to Anderson in the semifinal round after Glenn defeated Elite’s six-time and 2023 champion Erica Enders.
The final round saw Anderson’s left-lane win – three of four race winners came from the left lane – of 6.501/211.30 beat Glenn’s 6.516/210.50 in what can only be described as a nail-biter. Anderson earned his career-stretching 106th victory in Pro Stock to claim his sixth championship, tying him with Enders. While Glenn was first off the Christmas Tree, Anderson hunted him down to claim what he considered his most meaningful title of his exceptional career.
“We struggled the last three or four months,” Anderson said. Acknowledging that he’d had great race cars, “Every time I’d lose it was like a slug to the gut; crazy things would happen. I knew I had to figure it out and today we did. Today was like a dream. The sun shined on me and we had a flawless day. Nothing crazy happened,” if you don’t consider a close win crazy. “This is my sixth and I think it means the most. These young kids are trying to push me out the door, but I keep dragging my feet because I don’t want to go yet!”
In earning his 15th race victory at the Pomona venue well after sunset, he continued the recent dominance of his car from KB Titan Racing, along with Enders’ machine from Elite Motorsports. The duo have captured every title in Pro Stock since 2018, even with many younger competitors showing their hands. “Today’s kids are relentless,” Anderson acknowledged. “They can be .00 to teen on the tree like there’s nothing to it. I can do that, but it’s like an out-of-body experience. This place is special, especially when the sun goes down.”
The champions, their teams and the balance of the Countdown to the Championship contenders are being feted in Southern California Monday night, before preparations for the 2025 NHRA Mission Foods Drag Racing Series commence, leading up to the March 6-9 season starter with the NHRA Gatornationals on legendary Gainesville Raceway in central Florida.
Final standings by class:
Top Fuel
1. Antron Brown, 2,600; 2. Doug Kalitta, 2,538; 3. Justin Ashley, 2,526; 4. Shawn Langdon, 2,513; 5. Brittany Force, 2,478; 6. Clay Millican, 2,461; 7. Steve Torrence, 2,447; 8. Tony Schumacher, 2,399; 9. Tony Stewart, 2,325; 10. Shawn Reed, 2,270.
Funny Car
1. Austin Prock, 2,817; 2. John Force, 2,651; 3. Ron Capps, 2,529; 4. Matt Hagan, 2,519; 5. Bob Tasca III, 2,435; 6. Blake Alexander, 2,394; 7. Daniel Wilkerson, 2,369; 8. J.R. Todd, 2,336; 9. Chad Green, 2,300; 10. Cruz Pedregon, 2,262.
Pro Stock
1. Greg Anderson, 2,714; 2. Dallas Glenn, 2,703; 3. Aaron Stanfield, 2,702; 4. Erica Enders, 2,570; 5. Jeg Coughlin, 2,425; 6. Matt Hartford, 2,355; 7. Cristian Cuadra, 2,339; 8. Jerry Tucker, 2,263; 9. Troy Coughlin Jr., 2,254; 10. Eric Latino, 2,238.
Pro Stock Motorcycle
1. Gaige Herrera, 2,804; 2. Matt Smith, 2,715; 3. Richard Gadson, 2,511; 4. Angie Smith, 2,481; 5. Hector Arana Jr, 2,473; 6. Chase Van Sant, 2,457; 7. John Hall, 2,341; 8. Jianna Evaristo, 2,331; 9. Steve Johnson, 2,328; 10. Chris Bostick, 2,209.
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